Turned to Maple
by Devil's Sunrise
Summary: What happens when the Real World and MapleStory collide? A remake of my old fanfiction, but this time I'm determined to finish it. Read and Review!
1. Beginning

I pondered writing another fanfiction, as my others amounted to spectacular failures when I could not finish them. I toyed with the idea of one, and I got started on it when the first 3 chapters I had written were deleted by a freak virus that got into my computer. Great luck, eh? I shall get to rewriting that as well, for I believe writing things a second time can always make them better. That'll be great.

Then again, there's this one story that plagues my imagination with random twists and turns late at night. Anyone remember the tragedy that was "Turned to Maple"? A very well reviewed one, I loved the attention, but it completely exploded in my face when I got sidetracked. I am determined to regain whatever it was that had me going for Turned to Maple in the first place, and I proudly now present Turned to Maple, redone in all its glory.

Also, when that freak virus destroyed my files, I lost my old Microsoft Office. I'm now apparently using notepad to type this Author's Note, and I'm moving to OpenOffice something-or-other to start writing. I real pain in the ass, so far, but hopefully I'll get this started nicely. Happy reading, and here we go!

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A loud peal of thunder resounded outside, causing the entire house to rattle. I briefly looked up, and around, then went back to my game. Grinning, I crushed the my opposing team with a flurry of throwing-stars directed at the monsters, and smirked even bigger when a banner proclaiming "WIN" flashed across the screen. I punched the air in triumph as my character glowed and declared "LEVEL UP".

I noticed one of my buddies was on line, and decided to chat with him and see how his progress was going.

The window opened with a little _snick._

_Ping_. DaRkxHuE has entered.

**EdgeStrife**: Hey Darky! How's it going?

**DaRkxHuE**: sup pik!

**DaRkxHuE**: i just got 89, can't wait to use my casters

**EdgeStrife**: Oh, nice. I just got level 41. .

**DaRkxHuE**: lol, GRATZ! why don't you play pik anymore?

**EdgeStrife**: It bores me. I never caught up to you guys, even though I started higher leveled.

**DaRkxHuE**: you don't play as much as we do

**EdgeStrife**: Yeah, I have a life!

**DaRkxHuE**: oh shut up

**DaRkxHuE**: well i have to train if i wanna make it to 90 anytime soon.

**EdgeStrife**: Okay, cya Darky.

**DaRkxHuE**: cya pik

Eh. He would always be higher leveled than me, it seemed. I was his oldest friend in MapleStory and I wasn't allowed in his own guild because I was too low leveled. Not that I wanted to join, but it was kind of insulting all the same. I sighed and clicked closed the laptop on my lap. I stretched, then padded into the kitchen for a snack. Zoey got up from the empty food dish and sniffed around my socks, _mrrow_ing for food.

I leaned down to pet her, got a granola bar from the bottom shelf of the food cabinet, and headed toward her dish to feed her. Uncapping the huge container that held the cat food, I poured some of the pellets into three dishes, making a loud rattling sound. I heard two distinct _thump_s upstairs from my other two cats jumping off one of the beds in the bedrooms upstairs. Zoey started to eat while I went on to eat my granola bar, idly checking out the newspaper left on the kitchen table. After reading one article (about sports, which I didn't really care for), I looked around.

Zoey had finished her meal, and was licking her paws and rubbing them over her head to clean herself. Memo and Valentine (my other two cats) were nowhere to be seen. I looked upstairs, where I had heard them before, and they weren't near the top of the stairs or in any line of sight at all either. I walked up the stairs, looking around.

As I got up to the upstairs hallway (which was empty), I heard a loud hiss coming from my room. The cats were fighting again, great. I sighed, walked into my room, and jumped. Sitting in the middle of the floor, squeaking happily, was a gigantic ball of a substance that seemed to resemble Green Jell-O. I stared at it in amazement, then snapped to attention when my cat, Memo, hissed at it again. Valentine, being the frightful cat that she was, was crouched in the corner behind him.

The Jell-O gave another happy little squeak and noticed me. I then continued to stare at it in wonder. The green jelly-like creature seemed to be one I knew all too well. A character, a monster, from the game I had just been playing, MapleStory. It was a Green Slime, a weak monster that didn't pose much of a problem. Dealing with one in the game was easy, it didn't have any special moves or anything, it really only tackled you, and you just had to kill it. Of course, I didn't want to kill anything here...

While I was thinking this, the slime seemed to do a motion similar to a person cocking their head when thinking (A curious motion in which the slime's face and big happy smile rotated 45 degrees to the left). With one last gleeful squeal startling me from my thoughts, it jumped into the air (a startling four feet), and tackled me.

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**I have my second chapter written, and I'll be submitting it when I have either the third chapter or the fourth chapter done(if I'm in a really writing mood).**

**Please Review!**


	2. A slime?

**I'm writing this chapter before I submit the story because I vow to be several steps ahead of when I submit each chapter, so I never stop updating (in theory). Keep on reading and reviewing, people, I hope to hear from you in the near future when I post this.**

_**Note: I don't want it to seem like I'm copying off the several Maple-Real Life fanfictions, I'm just rewriting the one I started about exactly ONE YEAR ago.**_

**_(2/1: Got swamped right after I started this, so I'm pissed. Hope to still update to satisfy everyone. On top of work and crap, I also broke my arm, AGAIN. Wee!_**

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The slime hit me with a little _squelch_, knocking me down, and bounced on top of my chest several times. I swore, and smacked the thing off of me. It gave a little _squeal_ of pain, and bounced a couple feet away. I jumped up, and felt my chest where it had bounced a few times. A cold, icy, unpleasant feeling was there after the slime had attacked me, and it seemed to be sapping some of my energy. I stared at it in anger, and suddenly lashed out my foot in rage at the small creature. It screamed and burst into a puddle of green liquid, making a horrible stain in the rug. This resolved itself by dissolving into nothingness. I stared at the rug for a few seconds, surprised by my own anger and having lashed out at the creature.

I noticed a tiny coin had appeared where the puddle had been. I bent down, picked it up and examined it. The coin was large compared to normal quarters and dimes and nickels, and bore just the symbol of a maple leaf on each side. I pocketed it, and looked around. My cats had long fled the room, and were probably cowering under an armchair somewhere around the house. I grimaced at feeling the cold feeling again in my chest, and felt a need to sit down again. I walked down the stairs, and plopped back down onto the armchair I had been playing on the laptop in before. I sat for a moment, just regaining my energy (the cold feeling seemed to go away if I stayed still), then picked up the laptop. After turning it back on, I signed into MapleStory.

Invitation from **DaRkxHuE**. Y/N?

I got a chat message as soon as I got on line.

**DaRkxHuE: **hey pik

**EdgeStrife: **Hey Darky, sup?

**DaRkxHuE: i **saw something strange outside... sounds stupid

**EdgeStrife**: What? I saw something strange as well...

**DaRkxHuE**: well, it was really weird... i saw this 1 gigantic demented snail outside when I was getting the mail

**DaRkxHuE**: like the 1s in maple

**DaRkxHuE**: pik u there?

**EdgeStrife**: Yeah.

This was strange. It sounded almost like he experienced the same thing as me. He wrote more:

**DaRkxHuE**: well it like crawled toward me

**DaRkxHuE**: an i stepped on it and it did

**DaRkxHuE**: **died

**DaRkxHuE**: weird huh?

**EdgeStrife**: Yeah... mine is weirder...

**DaRkxHuE**: lol wat?

**EdgeStrife**: There was a Green Slime in my bedroom...

**DaRkxHuE**: WTF?

**EdgeStrife**: I know, I killed by kicking it. It hit me first.

**DaRkxHuE**: did it hurt?

**EdgeStrife**: A bit, weirdly. This weird cold feeling.

**DaRkxHuE**: weird

**EdgeStrife**: Oh, gtg, parents are home.

**DaRkxHuE: **kk... cya

I shut down the laptop. This was too weird. My parents weren't really home, but I wanted to exit the weird discussion and get something to eat. Killing the slime in my room and recovering had made me hungry again.

I didn't feel like another granola bar, so I decided on a bowl of Frosted Flakes. I saw Memo eating at his food dish. He looked up, startled, when I walked in, as if he expected another Slime to hurtle through the doorway at any moment. I patted him on the head, got out milk, a bowl, cereal, and a spoon, and began to eat. The food seemed to taste better and I suddenly felt more energetic while I was eating it. Wolfing down another bowl, it seemed like the best cereal I had ever eaten.

After putting my bowl and spoon in the dishwasher and the rest of the food away, I walked into the family room. I was just about to turn on the television when I heard a loud _bang_ coming from the basement, which opened into the family room. I certainly hoped it was just the cats this time. I glanced into the kitchen on my way to the door opening into the basement and froze. All three cats were in there, Zoey and Valentine eating while Memo watched me and the basement door. That couldn't be good.

I slowly turned the knob and opened the door a crack, peering around it. I didn't see anything down the stairs, with no lights on, but suddenly something slammed into the door with a _squelch _sound. I swore and fell down, but kicked the door shut, still not getting a glimpse of what was in there, though I had a pretty good idea. But, of course, I didn't want to go down there just yet.

Passing the cats, who looked at me fearfully, I walked up the stairs to my room. I looked around (rummaging through junk in my closet) and found what I was looking for, a metal rod I had found in someone's trash while out riding my bike. I had taken it and kept it because it was about the length of a thin sword. It even had a little skinny metal rod protruding from on end that would serve as a hilt. I then grabbed a tin lid from a big old popcorn tin (Which was now filled with miscellaneous toys from my childhood), some duct tape, and made a makeshift shield out of it. Now armed, I walked back down the steps to the middle floor. I paused at the basement door, which was silent, and turned around to the foyer where I got some twine from a cabinet. After tying one end around the doorknob, being as quiet as possible, I turned the knob a bit to make the door open. I crept back about ten feet, to stay away from whatever came out of the basement.

I slowly pulled the twine, opening the door inch by inch, until it was finally as far as I could pull it with the twine in my hand. I stared into the dark opening, seeing and hearing nothing, but sensing something was down in my basement. After about 20 seconds of standing completely still, I heard a _plop_.

Then two more.

_Plop plop plop plop plop._

Something, though I was quite sure it was more than one, was coming out of the basement. There was now a constant chorus of _plop_s, as if two dozen water balloons were being rolled down stairs. But they weren't going down the stairs. They were coming up. To me.

Then the noises suddenly ceased. I winced, knowing something was coming.

A little blue ball, held up on a thin waving tendril, appeared over the top of the stairs. Then, as if by some invisible signal, the _plop_s started again. Except with every _plop _appeared a creature like that of the one in my room, but blue, and with a bigger antenna (with the ball at the end) on its head. I watched in silence as what seemed like nearly three dozen appeared from the stairs, piling out into the family room. When all of them were finally upstairs (who knows how many might still be in the basement that hadn't come up to try and kill me), the first one and I simply stared at each other. All was silent, even the forms of the globules in back of this little army. Then, suddenly, as I was still processing most of this information, the leading creature vibrated as if clearing his throat, gave a loud squeak, and the entire procession of Slimes charged.


	3. Bubbling Fight

**I broke my arm, being an idiot. I can now type with it, obviously, so let's roll...**

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_A Bubbling, sometimes called a "Blue Slime", is, in fact, essentially a blue slime. Notable differences from the slime are an enlarged bubble on the end of its antenna,circle-shaped pupils (as opposed to the star shaped ones of the Slime), and its far greater strength. Many new players in the world of MapleStory find a Bubbling to be a very big threat and annoyance, as many quests need their spoils and they are sometimes too strong to be killed in mobs. A habit of the Bubbling is to attack in extreme numbers, which makes them a threat to many people in the Kerning City Subway._

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The bubbling army, a roiling, shrieking wave of Jell-O, charged at me, and I suddenly felt stupid holding a tin lid. I clambered on top of the couch just as the screaming mass reached me. I stabbed down with my "sword" a few times, popping a few of them (splattering the couch and a bit of me as well). I rolled backwards onto the coffee-table as the slimes started jumping up at me, and used the tin lid to defend my legs. I made a wide slice with my sword, cutting open all the Bubblings that had jumped on the couch.

Suddenly, a few came bounding around the couch, when I had been expecting them to jump over the couch at me. They rammed into my ribs from the side, causing the same icy sensation from before, plus the effect one would feel when being hit with a water balloon if it didn't pop. Fortunately, the bubbling did explode when I stabbed it in the face, spraying me with ice-cold gooey droplets.

I looked around for stragglers, and saw the last one coming over the couch before it hit me, and smacked it back against the wall with my tin lid, making a satisfying _thwack_ and _sploosh_ sound. That was the last one.

I stood, panting, with my side throbbing from the icy pain. It felt kind of like I'd been playing outside in the winter for too long, except without a shirt (which I would not recommend). I could already feel kind of lightheaded from it. I remained standing, recovering for a while, then shook my head to clear the buzzing sound and walked slowly through the kitchen and into the front room, where I had been sitting in my recliner before. I sat down, rubbing my side, and closed my eyes.

I didn't have any intention of doing so, but I slowly dozed off to sleep.

**[-------------------------]**

"Hellooo!" was the first thing I heard when I woke up. I sat, dazed for a sec, then shot up. Crap, my parents were home! The dead bubblings would still be near the door!

"Hi Dad, hi Mom!" I poked my head into the kitchen, peeking in on my parents, who had apparently gotten home from work at the same time. It was summer and all, but my Dad still had to work year round (just regular hours), and my Mom taught courses at a local university.

Most importantly, besides them getting home, was that the disgusting goop had disappeared from the furniture. My makeshift sword and shield were still lying on the couch and floor, and I walked in to greet my parents and pick my weapons up.

"What are those?" My dad asked, wiping his shoes on the mat outside, because they were wet from the rain.

"Nothing." Thankfully, my dad doesn't need a better explanation than that.

"Well, anyway, dinner in a half hour. Did you have a nice day?" Mom asked.

"Yeah, uneventful, but it was cool." I smirked a bit at _uneventful_, but I turned my head so they wouldn't see.

I stashed my stuff upstairs, in my room, near my bed, then signed on to my computer, then MapleStory. Darky wasn't on (DaRkxHuE), and I wasn't sure what I would say to him anyway. I wondered if he was being attacked by a butt-load of snails, and grinned. I went back to MCPQ, a Quest used to train and level up in the game, and crushed a few more enemy teams with a simple party of two people I randomly picked up out of channel 1 (the most popular channel in the game, where people mostly advertised their services in quests). All in all, nothing eventful happened. I gained about forty percent of the experience points needed for the next level, and then it was dinner time.

I sat down, said grace, and dug into some pasta. Pasta was just about my favorite meal, but it wasn't one of those rare favorite dishes that people get all excited about eating once a month. It was a regular thing for my parents to just make pasta, and for me to just gobble it up like there was no tomorrow.

My parents made small talk, and I asked them how their days were, and how work was going, and such. The food I was eating was feeling a lot tastier, and more filling and better. I suddenly realized why, or at least a theory of why this was so. In the game MapleStory, food often serves as a healing item, that will heal your character's health points, magic/mana points, etc.

I swallowed nervously after realizing this, and then realized that a healing item was hardly going to harm me and started digging in again. After I cleaned up, putting my dishes away, I went back on the computer, greeting some friends who had signed on while I was at dinner. Darky still wasn't on line.

I went back to training, and managed to level up yet again in about an hour. I signed off, tired again for the second time that day, and decided to go to bed. I checked if my sword and shield were still there, and got off to sleep.

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**I thought I finished writing this, and then realized the word count was pathetically small. So, I was gonna cut off with _uneventful_, then I realized I hadn't actually written that much, only about 650 words.**

**Getting my cast off on February 12th. Yay. Hope you like it, and I'll be updating soon. **

**()()()()()()()()()()()() Eat my brackets, Lyrei! Eat them! ()()()()()()()()()()()()**


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